And when your time comes and you rest with your ancestors,
I will raise up your heir after you, sprung from your loins,
and I will make his Kingdom firm.
This ancestor was not Solomon who started firm, who completed David's desired temple for the Lord, but who would go on to build temples for the gods of his Pagan wives. As Isaiah wrote, "If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all" (see Isaiah 7:9). In proof of which the Kingdom was split in two during the reign of Solomon's son Rehoboam. It might have seemed that the promise of the Lord to David had failed.
I will be a father to him,
and he shall be a son to me.
Your house and your Kingdom shall endure forever before me;
your throne shall stand firm forever.
The promise had not failed, it had just been delayed, or rather, was still waiting for its time of fulfillment in a different Son of David to whom God himself would be true Father. He was the one whose house and whose Kingdom could truly endure forever.
He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end (see Luke 1:32-33).
The priests of the Old Testament "were prevented by death from continuing in office" where as Jesus "holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues forever" (see Hebrews 7:23-24). As with his priesthood so too his kingship.
I will fix a place for my people Israel;
I will plant them so that they may dwell in their place
without further disturbance.
Mankind had shown a history of weakness in the face of temptation and sin, and were unable to actualize or instantiate this promise in any specific individual, though it was at times glimpsed in those who were dedicated the Lord. Only Jesus was able to deliver on this promise in its entirety. Only he was able to conquer the true and ancient foe of Israel, the Devil, and thereby overcome the powers of sin and death.
And when your time comes and you rest with your ancestors,
I will raise up your heir after you, sprung from your loins,
and I will make his Kingdom firm.
Yet the one who would be our savior was born was not just injected from outside the human race as a completely foreign or alien entity. He was to come precisely from the promised line, in spite of all the human failure and weakness to which that line, and indeed all of mankind, was given. His redemption would not come so much from outside as from within. He took upon himself the tired, broken, reality of our humanity in order to refashion it and make it fit to fulfill the promise. In turn our humanity was elevated and made able to receive the only thing which could fulfill it, God himself. The Son of God would become a son of man so that the sons of men could be made sons of God.
Humans tend to view power as the solution to our problems. Faced with a failed promise like that given to David we probably would have tried to solve it with a stronger military, better laws, greater rulers whose rule would be difficult or impossible to disobey. But God emphatically did not fulfill his promise in this way. Humans seemed too weak. But God's solution was to become weaker still, a little helpless child in the arms of his mother Mary. As he grew in age and in wisdom he did not amass an army whereby he might conquer human foes. Rather he gave himself into the hands of his foes, both natural and supernatural. In this his foes thought they had won, that they had finally conquered the last gasp of a long tired promise. But it was precisely the opposite. The strength of evil proved to be its ultimate undoing.
For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men (see First Corinthians 1:25).
When we gaze at the infant Jesus we can behold God's victory, veiled, yet inchoately revealed. His Holy Face, laid in a manger in Bethlehem, can help us set our hope where we can truly find our help, and teach us to trust in God over and against the appearances of power and prestige in the world. This babe is indeed the antidote to fear. He has come from on high to free us to become who we were always meant to be.
Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery (see Hebrews 2:14-15).
Jesus wants to conquer our fears and lead us into the freedom of the Holy Spirit. It is only in this freedom that we can find peace in our own hearts and become true agents of peace to a world still veiled in darkness. Since we need him so much let us fix all of our hope on him and eagerly await Christmas when, in grace and in mystery, "the dawn from on high shall break upon us, to shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death".
For ever I will sing the goodness of the Lord.
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